clinton, waiting for her to give the word, but the president, having stood so strong in her defense, strongly in her defense around what she said that up and gauzy and the video that she said was the cause of the attack that killed those americans that now they are boxed in. he prtty well has to stick with her. this is are going around to say in private what she was in public which, based on the testimony from the general and others is, it was a calculation that it was a decision that was made at the white house that it would be bad business to be out saying that it was a terrorist. lou: what is your reaction, tucker? >> what a waste of time. remarkable. i mean it. as a liticalcalculation. the president just was reelection. a tough campaign. he wins by a convincing margin. he is at the apogee of its power. and what does he choose to do? he spends it on getting susan rice a job running the state department. this is pretty small potatoes by comparison to a lot of other things going on right now, chief among them the fiscal clef. there are a lot of other questions hanging in the air, a

explicitly says that congress has the power to impose taxes both the pay for defense and to provide for the general welfare of the nation and very first sentence of article one section eight says that congress shall have the power to lay and collect taxes duties imposed on exercises to pay the debts and provide for the jet the common defense and the general welfare of the united states so how is it possible that when the constitution says that one of the very specific jobs of congress is to lay and collect taxes and the oath they take says that they that they will do so without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion that a member of congress could possibly swear an oath to a multi-millionaire k.-street lobbyist but that member of congress will refuse to perform one of their constitutional duties and what sort of member of congress would willingly swear an oath to a front man for a small group of billionaires that that member of congress would violate the oath years she swore to follow the constitution with out mental reservations and without purpose of evasion. is not a man who us

about defense cuts, discretionary spending, and it's about tax cuts. only if the democrats agree to bring in the programs for the elderly and poor and middle class would they become part of the discussion. and there's a strong faction among democrats who are saying do not do that. you know, social security is not part of this problem. so it should not be part of the discussion. harry reid, in fact, has been extremely firm on that. he said i will not be part of discussions that include social security as part of this bargain. so if they stick to that, then they won't be. >> yeah, there's so many moving pieces. susan, today, the president's going to meet with small business owners. friday he's going to montgomery, pennsylvania, to visit a small business that will be impacted. very campaign like stuff. what's he trying to do here? >> yeah, who is he not meeting with this week? that would be congressional -- that would be members of congress, especially those house republicans would be the critical partners on this. so he's trying to take a very different approach than he took in the fi

which will turn our ability to3 fund every government program imaginable, everything from defense to entitlement and everything in between which will be a difficult day. that is the avalanche i am concerned about the. gerri: all kinds of things being talked about now to solve this disco cliff issue. other areas to generate some kind of revenue. for example, one of these ideas is raising the medicare eligibility age to 67 from 55. would something like that work for you? would you be willing to sign onto an idea like that? >> i am interested in the entitlement reform. in order to make these programs available for those who have come to rely on them, for those who have come to expect that they will be there for them. in order to make sure it can survive we have to make adjustments like that. i have already introduced and co-sponsor of legislation that would do some of those things. absolutely i would be interested in discussions along those lines gerri: thank you for coming on. great to see you, and we hope to see you again soon. >> thank you, gerry. gerri: a lot more to come, including

growth in spending has not been in the non-defense discretionary. the cost of security programs in that same time period has gone up 60%. the cost of mandatory programs is up 30%. i want to call your attention to one aspect progressives need to remind people. of the $1.50 trillion already in spending cuts, $900 billion comes from spending. we have given far more than when it comes to defense side. let's talk about those for a minute. the budget control act and sequestration would result in dramatic cuts to spending. we have heard a lot of talk about the impact it will have on our national defense. to believe that having ended one war in iraq and ending another in afghanistan that we cannot find savings in the pentagon, i do not think that is a fair assessment. there are savings to be had that will not compromise our national security. the simpson-bowles commission approach established in the outer years to lay the temptation to go back into the non-defense accounts when too much political pressure keeps you out of defense spending. i would hope any long-term agreement would improve

remove them. kennedy fry to work out what defensive mean. what is it we can't live with and can live with in cuba? the american doctrine has different idea. the soviet doctrine, we goat the details there, but there's a struggle to prove what the understanding is. the long range bombers to the americans, these had about 750 mile range. they could hate lot of the southeast sides. they were very old. they were obsolete. they weren't much match for the american anti-- the american offense system in the southeastern united states. but the problem was -- and let's backtrack. kennedy himself did not think these were particularly a big problem. and actually it comes through on the tapes as the one who is least worried about the il27. he's on tape a few things saying we don't want it get hung on these. i thought we were being a bit unreasonable trying to get them out. he's trying to put himself in crew shove's position. we have to get them out. even ia military threat in the clin cap sense. to the american public, they are not going to be allowed to stay. we can't live with the american publi

interested in it. we have president obama's very strong defense of had her at his press conference last week. beyond that, we really don't have all that much. i would note something and want to give credit where it is due, mark murray, the deputy political director, pointed it out, saw it on twitter, we focus on ayotte, graham and mccain but remember, democrats may not need those three votes to confirm susan rice if she is put forward. they need probably five to seven republicans, maybe they can find them elsewhere. i'm not saying that i know that for a fact, but let's not assume that even if the three of them are opposed that she could never be confirmed. >> they can block it by using a hold. >> any one of them can. >> yeah. >> yeah, kelly. this is not the kind of confirmation you want to send your top diplomat out. that's not the launch pad for a successful tenure as secretary of state. and, of course, waiting in the wings, john kerry, who we understand the white house will nominate to be defense secretary. i'm told he would accept that post even though he would prefer to be secr

? >> well, as you probably know i'm completely against war. i believe in self-defense. i believe if you get hit, you hit back. preemptive wars i don't believe in. i don't think they're necessary. i think wars are started to make money. they make money for the people who start a war over here and a war over there and sell bombs to both sides. >> when you look at what happens in the middle east in my lifetime i can remember, pretty much most of yours. do you see any hope there or any chance of actually peace in the middle east? >> if you believe in the bible, it says two things. it says there will always be wars and rumors of wars. it also says for a thousand years somewhere in the future we have peace. so hopefully those thousand years are coming up on us. >> were you pleased barack obama got re-elected? >> i'm glad he got re-elected. i think he has a lot of things in his favor, the things that he has ran on. the women all believe in the things that he's talking about. the blacks and the hispanics and the women and if you have those three things on your side, you're going to win. >>

defense of cuba. and he looks halfway around the world to where the peace deal is most vulnerable. .. and kirchoff kept bringing up her land that we are going to bring this up in november at the united nations after the midterm election. so he had been broadcasting this to the summer. kennedy had been reading all of these reports. the conditions going into this process to believe that kirchoff is going to force the issue. that the issue that kennedy keeps coming back to cuba. so if u.s. kennedy would be sent to hear an kennedy himself was talking about this, kennedy would say, west berlin. he would not say defensive cuba. so the cuba angle doesn't come through a lot. they're not really thinking this through because it doesn't make sense. the way that it's in 1962 would be to do some kind of mutual trudy were to spend lots of conventional weapons, which is what they were doing, but not then long-range missiles that the united states. >> is funny, khrushchev saturday said that tactical fields. he would've had a a hard time convincing weapons. the flipside of that is that deterrence

to repeat offenders. the detroit lions defensive taxle ndamukong suh should expect no leniency when the league reviews this play today. suh kicked houston quarterback matt schaub in the groin, at least it seemed that way during the lions thanksgiving day game. good morning, jamie. >> good morning, carol. how are you? >> i'm good. the nfl is supposed to review this play. do you think it's already made up its mind about suh? >> it sure sounds like it. ray anderson, vice president of football operations was quoted extensively over the weekend. he said what you just said. that is that past actions, past indiscretions will come into play. there was already a report from mike freeman of cbssports.com that suh will be sus penlded for at least one game. apparently he did kick him in the groin. i think when you look at that tape and we've all looked at it over and over again since thanksgiving day. he does roll over. it's hard to say he has control of his leg. there's that kind of secondary motion where it looks to me, like a lot of people he intentionally strikes schaub right where he did.

the 1980s and the tax cuts of ronald reagan combined with greater defense spending leading to hugely higher annual deficits covered by borrowing. and thus again a swelling national debt. but with no wars at all. then under presidents george h.w. bush and bill clinton we took action. for a while, both parties agreed, says simon johnson. >> there was a bipartisan agreement to raise revenue and put something of a damper on spending. so that's an important moment in the bigger picture, of course, that was just a small hesitation on the part of a much larger national debt. >> reporter: because in the bigger picture, a president just can't accomplish very much if he's cutting spending and won't raise taxes. and so yet again, more borrowing. under presidents george w. bush and barack obama. higher deficits and debt that, because of the graying baby boom, are fated to get even worse. >> the population was always going to age, the baby boomers were going to retire. they were paying a lot of social security contributions in 1990s. we were always going to shift into structural deficit for that

line for the secretary of defense slot is massachusetts senator john kerry if he moves to the department of state senate seat opens up and they'll be a special election in massachusetts to replace him which means the big defense contractors can throw a few million bucks at scott brown and very possibly get another republican in the senate and get rid of a democrat president obama should have seen this coming thinking naively that the three amigos might actually have real concerns about what happened in benghazi something ambassador rice had nothing to do with but which she dared discuss on sunday morning t.v. shows the obama administration organized an hour long private briefing the acting director of the cia susan rice herself and the three amigos so all their. sions could be answered but of course they weren't interested in facts or truth or even the impact their behaviors may have an international relations all the three amigos wanted to do was to smear rice so obama would be forced to drop or for kennedy opening the way for scott brown excuse me kerry opening the way for s

we have people from a cross section with defense lawyers prosecutors, law enforcement, a lot of people on our task force. when we talk to law enforcement one thing that stood out was the law enforcement cannot even detain someone if you shoot someone dead in the streets of florida, and you claim stand your ground, law enforcement can't even detain you under the immunity provision so they can createlyaccurately do an investigation. my task force came out with amend so law enforcement can do their job and investigate the claim of stand your ground. >> eliot: was governor scott semiicsympathetic to that narrow amendment, or did you feel that there was a pre-ordained out come in saying that the law was good as it is. >> definitely. i gave them a copy of my task force which has a cross section of republicans and democrats across the aisle, and they had that in their possession during the whole road show around the state. they never even discussed it. when they put out their report it was never discussed. i don't know how a rational person can think that law enforcement should be able

decision. >> secretary of state, hillary clinton, coming to the defense of his possible successor, u.n. ambassador susan rice. yet, the smear campaign against susan rice continues as more republicans pile on. rice had another tough day on capitol hill today. now, senate republicans are blaming rice for yet another security failure. the u.s. embassy bombings in kenya and tanzania 14 years ago. >> it troubles me so much is the benghazi attack in many ways echos the attacks of those embassies in 1998 when susan rice was head of the african region for our state department. >> senator bob corker in tennessee had a warning for the president. >> i would just ask the president to step back for a moment and realize that all of us here hold the secretary of state to a very different standard than most cabinet members. >> while republicans say they are concerned about susan rice advancing bad intel, they didn't think twice about confirming condoleezza rice as secretary of state. susan collins, lindsey graham and john mccain all voted to confirm condoleezza rice. who would support as the next secr

side of the border israeli defense forces reported that 30 rockets were fired into their airspace, the israeli airspace from gaza but most of those rockets were then destroyed by israel's iron dome security shield that we talked about here last night. five israelis have been killed in the conflict so far. and while israel still hasn't sent ground troops into gaza, get this. 16,000 soldiers are now standing ready at the border of gaza which, of course, makes tomorrow's negotiations all the more critical. so joining me now for prospective on the conflict is hussein ibish a senior fellow at the american task force on palestine. he's coming to us via skype from pompton plains, new jersey. hussein, welcome back inside "the war room." >> thank you governor. >> jennifer: you bet. so what, just to bring people up to speed, what are the palestinians asking for this negotiation? >> well, hamas, to be specific because hamas is not the diplomatic representative. that's the plo but there is this division between the west bank and gaza. what hamas wants at this point is pretty clearly is to agr

. we want to raise taxes, cut defense -- we're willing to do all four of those things. megyn: marc, how does taking money out of medicare and giving it to obamacare cut spending? [laughter] >> it doesn't. >> that's not what i said, megyn. that's not what i said. >> it doesn't cut spending. they cut money out of medicare and put it to fund obamacare, but president obama has not put forward a plan to deal with the entitlement crisis. he put forward no plan on social security, medicare or medicaid, which he himself admits is what is driving the debt and driving the real fiscal crisis. so they have put forward no plans whatsoever, and when paul ryan and others have put forward our plans, they've pilied them for it. i'm glad president obama's meeting with simon. i'd love for him to meet with john john boehner. [laughter] megyn: simon's got a lot of good ideas. were you in that meeting with the unions and the progressive groups that the president had -- >> no. i was in a different meeting. they can't meet with all at the same time. megyn: were you in the meeting that the progressive grou

. overnight we learn that israel's defense minister, ehud barak is resigning his post. that's effective come january. that development comes as delegations for both israel and hamas meet in cairo today. they're meeting with egyptian officials to try to advance those cease-fire talks. and egypt's president mohamed morsi will meet today with judges to explain his edict barring them from overturning any decision that he makes or any laws that he imposes until a new parliament is formed. reza sayah is in cairo this morning. let's start with mohamed morsi, please. >> yeah, good morning, soledad. a few thousand protesters still here in south tahrir squares, especially those who camped out over the past several days, still seeing some clashes. most of them triggered by what seem to be teenagers and twenty somethings out here looking for trouble. we also saw our first fatality of the protest last night on sunday in a northern city where a 15-year-old member of the muslim brotherhood youth movement was clubbed to death. at this point the brotherhood doesn't seem to be using that fatali

corporations built the units. the government participated in the defense department. government doesn't build weaponry. private-sector does that. i presented the figures earlier today with the students and faculty members. in 1980, government contracting with the private sector represented about $47 billion. it was $513 billion in 2008. that is a bit of an increase. you are raising a good question. there are conflicts between government and business that are hard to work out, especially in areas of regulation. they do not like that. there are many ways that the government and the private sector have worked together to produce some of the great achievements in human history. >> please chummy in thanking professor rainey. >> thank you. >> to us for a program on retirement issues for the baby boomer generation. the event features author marc freedman. will open the lines and get your thoughts. organizations are more likely to cut matching contributions than retirement plans. more of that, not beginning at 2:00 p.m. eastern. the united nations security council is meeting to discuss the situ

defense cuts that are kicking in at the end of the year and they believe if you let all of this happen on the tax side, on the spending side there will be big cuts to the pentagon but not likewise cuts to medicare and other big entitlement programs and they believe that is another part. on the tax issue the republicans are playing defense. if they don't act the white house is ready to blame this on them in terms of going off the cliff. after coming out of the election where the republicans nuclear a hit the white house hopes they will not want to take another big blow after the election so quickly. >>shepard: powerball sales are skyrocketing, upping the jackpot and the odds someone will win the big surprise tonight. it is at $550 million. that is a record for powerball. the odds are slim of swinging, 1 in 75 million but zero chance if you don't buy. people are dreaming. >> i felt my whole life i was supposed to be rip. >> pay the bills and house off. not have to work. ever again. >> i have 17 charities first. they come first. >> i want to buy a house. >> how will you spend it? >> take

think you should be worried if you have a defense job and we all ought to be worried whether we are dependent upon other aspects of the federal budget. whether we're worried about the regulation of our food safety, whether we're worried about our borders being secure, whether we're worried about fbi being supported, it's all affected by sequestration. >> joining me now, cnbc washington reporter eamon javers. you heard the numbers we just ran down. what is the short-term tangible consequence if we don't get action on the fiscal cliff. >> cote is right, it does cause uncertainly. life is uncertain and so they know that there's going to be this issue and that washington is going to wrestle with it. in the short term, the very short term, i think actually some of the hype around the fiscal cliff is a little overblown, particularly because the first couple of days or week or so after we go over the fiscal cliff we won't see all that many impacts. all these tax and spending impacts take months to go into effect. it doesn't impact the economy until people start paying taxes, which could be

their leaders. the israelis exposed their missile defense system and largely defeated the short range missile and rocket system. heather: perhaps that was a short-term goal and the long-term goal perhaps has to do with iran. >> we are seeing a window of a new kind of war. if the israelis attack iran the response will be a three-tiered myself isle and rocket system the world has never seen before. one would be short range that hamas would use. israel defended against those using their so-called iron dome system and they conducted many air attacks against stockpiles and battery sites. the second system would come out of hezbollah from lebanon. they have 100,000 myself isles. those can reach all of israel's major cities. iran * could fire a ballistic long-range missile which can also reach all of israel's major city. what you would see if all of those tiered systems are at play, attacks coming from the north, east and west. they would cope with the attack from the north using a system called baited sling. they would deal with the iranians with a system called arrow in conjunction with ir

sequester of the defense spending cuts and we're not going to fold the debt ceiling increase into this deal, and i think the white house was very taken aback by the meagerness of that offer. and so there's a different tone. but if the substance is going to be enough and the time is short, it's really going to be complicated to get this done by the end of the year. >> mosark, if the debt ceiling not wrapped up, the president is not going for it. he does not want to face this twice. >> it's impossible to imagine, that's such a key piece for the white house, just not to have this fight again. it's going to have to be a joint whip operation in the house. i think there will be a period from the time there's a deal amongst the leaders in the bipartisan leadership in the white house, there will be a period from then until it gets passage in the house that will look like where are the votes going to possibly come from. but if stan hoyer and john boehner are willing to do a deal that they can both support, i think they can get to a majority in the house. the key -- the real trick is the two-par

improve its defense capabilities we have great has been made because it fears possible future attacks from the likes of israel all the us against its nuclear program it's now planning a major label drill. almost two hundred people have taken to the streets of chile's capital santiago to protest and new fishing protesters say the new legislation discriminates against independent fishermen be an authorized rally ended in skirmishes between demonstrators and police to disperse the protesters and arrested at least ten of them. deadly floods in panama have forced more than six thousand people out of their homes says hundreds of houses were buried under water some roads have been washed away by massive landslides downpours have eased off says choose day rivers overflowing their banks damaging bridges and buildings. coming up next to iraq up for sale our special report on those who left their morals at home. during the war. was his day starts at five am even earlier in the winter tending to his flock of story hundred sheep in the mountains and plains of t.v. thirty five years old it wasn't t

shortly after the meeting reiterating her defense. i quote "we stressed that neither i nor anyone else in the administration intended to mislead the american people at any stage in this process and the administration updated congress and the american people as our assessments evolved." joining us now is abc white house correspondent jake tapper, the author of the much lauded new book "the outpost." first, i want to ask you about benghazi gate. honestly die understand what the senators continue to be upset about. susan rice has acknowledged her statements were wrong but were based upon the best intelligence at the moment. is there any reason not to believe that statement on her part? >> well, one of the things that senator graham said today was that he wants more of the investigation -- the information to come out. the fbi agents who had interviewed survivors of the attack. and he wants to know more information before he says he would be willing to elevate somebody who was involved in any part of this controversy. i do think that susan rice is not really the one that i am personally mos

, there is no near-term risk factored in, and that makes me very nervous. we are being very defensive, given that risk is still out there. i wouldn't be shocked to see 5%, 10%, if we went off the cliff on the s&p. that wouldn't be a big surprise to me. put it into perspective, last august when we had the debt ceiling and a downgrade, we saw a much bigger fall in the stock market then. >> susie: you say you're uncomfortable with this kind of uncertainty. how are you positioning the portfolios for your investors? you said you're defensive. tell us more. >> so into the u.s. election, especially given that the polls were leaning towards obama, we had taken a defensive stance already. we had gone slightly underweight equities, and added more things like high-yield mortgage debt, emerging market debt, and mortgage-backed securities, that will yield as much as capital appreciation, and investments that have lower volatility than the stock market. so we have an overweight there. those investments i just spoke about, that's about 24% of our portfolio right now, and that's definitely helped us

conservatives like myself who think that national defense is important, should cut on military spending, and cut on some social welfare spending. i think that compromise could get the spending cuts. >> here is the question, both sides are going to have to compromise beyond defense spending. is there anything you see supporting? >> mostly has to be on the spending side. we used to spend 20% of gdp. we're now spending 25% of gdp. federal spending has gone up at an alarming rate in the past four years. and when people say we have to raise taxes on rich people, one there is not enough money and you often find when you get rai to raising rates, you get less revenue. and when you lower rates you get more revenue. >> what do you make of tom cole's proposal that republican lawmakers should extend tax rates for those making less before the end of this year and deal with the tax rates for the wealthiest americans at a later date? >> once you separate them out there is not a lot of sympathy among the public for rich people. they say let's get those rich people. but the public often doesn't realize that the

center who wants to compromise america's national defense but to believe that having ended one war in iraq and ending another in afghanistan and reassessing our role in the world we cannot find savings in the pentagon is not affair assessment. >>reporter: i have heard that from others, as well, after two wars, after the great expansion of our military over the two wars, there could be some savings to be had but at this point a lot of discussions are going on, a lot behind closed doors and not a lot of leaks. there is a lot of anxiety about what, actually, will get done if it gets done. >>shepard: thank you from the rotunda. personal income was up across the country including in all major metropolitan areas. the federal bureau of economic analysis reports 98.4 percent of the counties saw an increase. the biggest growth was in middle america in areas in the blue: nebraska, north dakota, south dakota. small towns saw 3 percent increase in income per person compared to 1.8 percent in urban areas. the analysts say farm income and especially the natural gas industry were major factors. now

city. it is fragile. israeli defense forces say there are five rockets launched from gaza since the cease-fire went into effect. and prime minister benjamin netanyahu's statement was cautious. he said he was willing to give the egyptian cease-fire a chance before there is a need to use greater force. not exactly a ringing endorsement. here's the key thing, while the united states got involved with a visit from hillary clinton this deal was not brokered by the usa. >> this is a critical moment for the region. egypt's new government is assuming the responsibility and leadership that has long made this country a corner stone of regional stability and peace. >> seemingly unexpected leader was egypt's mohamed morsi, a man we've seen at rallies where egyptians chanted we are hamas. it's an impressive feat and the first time that israel has ever negotiated with an islamist government. but there are some shady things about the deal. according to an israeli newspaper, neither side officially signed penned to paper on the cease-fire agreement which raise sometimes questions about it. and here

january 1st, a republican nightmare will occur. all income tax rates will go up and defense spending will be cut by 600 billion. other spending, some of it dear to republicans, will also be cut by another 600 billion. the fiscal cliff is much scarier to republicans than it is to democrats. so, the president and his allies must continue to make republicans believe they are willing to go off cliff. senator durbin simply said if we do go off the cliff or the curb on january 1st, we have to be able to quote stop economic growth to prevent us from stopping at the economic growth and hurting everyone. in other words, we have to then quickly craft a legislative deal that can stop the damage to the economy that would occur if we went off the cliff and stayed off the cliff. john boehner recognizes that the fiscal cliff is the president's leverage, but boehner believes he has leverage, too. politico reported this morning president barack obama made a demand of how john boehner near the end of their first white house meeting on the fiscal cliff, raised the debt limit before year's end. boehner

libya. however as brian mooar reports, her defense failed to convince her republican critics. >> reporter: embattled u.n. ambassador susan rice went to capitol hill to explain what they knew and now knows about the deadly attack on the u.s. consulate in libya. but she failed to silence her republican critics. >> all i can tell you, that the concerns i have are greater today than they were before and we're not even close to getting the basic answer. >> reporter: rice was accompanied by acting cia director michael morell who helped explain the flawed talking points rice repeated in talk show appearances days after the libya attack. in a statement rice said we certainly wish we had perfect information, as is often the case, the intelligence assessment has evolved. >> she said what she believed was true and she was under no political influence from the white house. >> reporter: republicans aren't buying that. >> we are significantly troubled by many of the answers that we got and some that we didn't get. >> reporter: rice is also defending her own potential nomination as secretar

united states military. according to our secretary of defense, it would be shooting ourselves in the foot. the smallest navy since 1914 and the smallest air force in the history of the country so sequestration must be replaced. i'm willing to generate revenue. it's fair to ask my party to put revenue on the table. we're below historic averages. i will not raise tax rates to do it. i will cap deductions. if you cap deductions around the $30,000, $40,000 you can raise a trillion dollars in revenue. the people who lose their deductions are the upper income americans. to do this i want entitlement reforms. republicans always put revenue on the table. we never cut spending. i'm looking for more revenue for entitlement review before the end of the year. >> i want to ask senator durbin about that. in the end, norquist said that you're not going to go through with this promise to race revenues because you quote like being a senator. your response? >> i love being a senator and i want to be a senator that matters for the state of south carolina and the country. when you're $16 trillion in deb

, thanks for having me. a general contracting company, mainly in defense, and we are located in baton rou, louisiana, reasonable offices in dallas, texas, and general contractor. -erri: all right, julia? >> hi, thank you so much, gerri. we help people become healthier, happier, and smarter. gerri: i need a lot of that, yeah. >> it helps you exercise better and sleep better and get better nutrition. gerri: oh, my lord. >> lose pounds. gerri: sounds magical. >> we hope it is. gerri: andy, you're a defense contractor; correct? >> yes, thank you very much for having me tonight. gerri: you're welcome. glad to have you here. andy, how did the president fi you and decide you were the right small business person to have on? >> well, we do, down here in florida, we do computer based and web base training, growing from me, myself, and i over the last five years to 10 # 5 employees in ten states. we've been reck nilsedded by -- recognized by the small business administration and "ink" magazine ranking number 36. weave been on the radar, and we got the call from the sba that they needed a small b

defense appropriations act which would take away the palestinians' money -- the palestinians on the west bank, not hamas, but the west bank have had the benefit of some american economic aid because of improvements that their prime minister fayed has achieved and cracked down on corruption, other reforms in the last couple of years, so they do risk that. i'm not sure it would go through but it is one of those things that can rocket through the u.s. congress. >> reporter: there is that. there is that threat of sanctions if they do it. israel saying they're going to withhold funds from the taxation money they collect for the palestinians. yeah. there's all of the threats to abbas. but he insists on going forward because, he says, there's no other way for the palestinians to achieve this, negotiations have not achieved anything. there's another important point to mention, andrea, looking at what hamas achieved with mini war against israel, the diplomatic and political breakthrough they achieved, not a military success, but politically and diplomatically, hamas achieved a great deal of recog